By Beryl Ringos
Dubai, UAE: The clergy have demanded to be at the center of climate health solutions as they deal directly with vulnerable communities who are experiencing first-hand impacts of climate-induced disasters.
Their demands come at a time when millions of Africans are experiencing multiple health hazards not limited to hunger, malnutrition, and viral disease outbreaks.
Day 4 of COP28 highlighted the intersection of climate and health whereby it was noted that farmers are unable to produce food due to unfavorable climatic conditions such as erratic rainfall patterns.
‘’Climate justice is about caring for the vulnerable population, for those who have been affected by a crisis they didn’t cause,’’ Rev. Dr. Ezekiel Gibson Lesmore.
The clerics pushed for the need for the government to show leadership in protecting and providing basic human needs amidst climate catastrophic events.
Khushwant Singh, Head of the PaRD Secretariat said: ‘’We should stop being leaders, the divine is leading us and we need to become servants.’’
Lesmore emphasized that in some communities in Africa where there is no government presence, you will find a religious presence.
“We have a responsibility to increase awareness of our faith communities with regards to climate mitigation and adaptation,’’ he said.
He stressed that human greed is at the center of the climate crisis. We have destroyed Mother Earth with a neo-liberal capitalist economic model with catastrophic climate impacts.
While endorsing COP 28 Declaration on Climate and Health Lesmore embraced the attention given to the link between climate change and health and urged African countries to strengthen their public health systems capacity to deliver equitable, sustainable, and climate-resilient services to all their citizens.
Faith leaders called for a collective effort to empower grassroots communities in the fight against climate change. They said that increased citizen awareness and engagement were important for advocacy and accountability on climate action.
Lesmore: ‘’The role of religious leaders should not be confined to conducting opening and closing prayers. We have a role as prophetic advocacy based on facts and data from frontline communities where we serve.’’
On the first Global Stocktake review at COP28 Karimi Kinoti, PaRD Africa Voice equated the process to a report card on the collective progress of all countries in their implementation of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.
“Unfortunately, the progress to keep global warming within 1.5 degrees is dismal and the world is headed for 2.4-2.6 degrees. We must move beyond rhetoric to actual concrete action, and faith actors must be visible in reversing this crisis’’ Says Kinoti.
